Global Health Sciences, Oral issues and AIDS

My major scholarly and clinical interest for the last thirty-plus years has been the impact on the mouth and on the health sciences of HIV and AIDS. This has led to a focus on broader aspects of global health sciences, oral issues and AIDS being the most significant to me. My colleagues and I have been privileged to make contributions that have been of broad significance in the diagnosis and care of patients with HIV infection. This work has brought me into contact with a wide array of people, problems and issues worldwide in academic and community health care, in basic, clinical and social/behavioral biomedical science as well as in industry. This has extended into the political arena statewide, nationally and internationally as we have sought and defended funding for research work in our field and for dental and medical research in general, for care for HIV-infected people and concerning broader issues of neglect, stigma, poverty and disparity in global health. My leadership roles in UCSF’s AIDS activities culminated in my becoming Director of the campus-wide AIDS Research Institute 2003-2012. My work has led to extensive media contact, including television, radio and the press and I have learned to respect their role in presenting our work to the public. Similarly, I have come to work with and develop mutually supportive relationships with community representatives and groups, including activists. I have been able to continue my research while assuming significant administrative responsibilities and have ventured into areas of global health beyond my original focus on oral health and on AIDS. I have been very active in the growing Global Health Sciences Program at UCSF and also led for seven years the Sjögren’s Syndrome registry [SICCA].

As Associate Dean for Global Oral Health, indeed in most of my leadership roles, I offer a bridge between Dentistry and the other health sciences and ensure that our field both takes innovation and momentum from the mainstream while contributing to it in many ways. I try to bring elements of that set of experiences and skills to bear on elevating the relevant programs of the School to their rightful place of preeminence, identify and nurture new investigators and clinician scholars in oral global health and foster new initiatives.